Savethesaveable.com – Focus On Those Who Need Our Help
Savethesaveable.com is a special page, an marketing campaign, dedicated to the animals who are ‘at risk’ for one reason or another at Pima Animal Care Center (PACC). These are the same pets that are also most likely to be overlooked by the prospective adopters coming to the shelter and are not in the public eye other than facebook.
Most importantly, the page features animals that are currently on deadline at the shelter. This means the shelter has determined they cannot maintain the animal at the shelter due to their medical or behavioral issues and will put the animal down if not rescued or adopted by a certain date. We encourage the public to seriously consider these animals which may have what you would consider a minor characteristic that fits just fine in YOUR home. The classic example for dogs is one that doesn’t get along with other dogs. If you only plan to have one, and you aren’t the type to frequent the dog parks or have friends bring dogs over to visit, then there is NO reason you shouldn’t consider a dog whose life is on the line because he/she cannot share a kennel in the shelter. For cats a typical example is ringworm. A very common fungal infection (like athlete’s foot) that is a treatable, curable inexpensive condition. Ringworm is contagious and PACC is not able to provide the necessary care in the shelter. You can save a life and have a perfectly normal beautiful healthy kitten or cat after a typical 6 weeks of treatment.
Other animals that are featured on the page are those that have just been there too long- we define that as over a month. While there may be no explanation for why they are still there, many will deteriorate in a shelter environment so the length of stay is a real concern. They are increasingly at risk for becoming ill or developing behavior problems (and you would be too!)
The mature dogs and cats (defined by PACC as age 7 and up) are featured because they are at risk for staying in the shelter longer than the average pet. You may know that cats and the smaller dogs are not ‘seniors’ by age 7 as they often live to 15 or more. But people like babies and youngsters, often overlooking the benefit of the calmer, often trained, animals.
Other animals featured on the page include those considered ‘special needs adoptions’ which indicates a need for adopters/rescues to anticipate following up with a condition. It may be valley fever, ear infections, a fractured limb or a history of situational biting that is considered to have good outcome with continued training.
Savethesaveable.com has 3 pages- one that explains many of the conditions mentioned and one that features currently waiting pets and then we are adding some success stories on the third page.
As our community gets closer and closer to becoming a No Kill community we will only succeed by learning about and saving those that can be saved but are still at risk of, or currently are, being put down for lack of alternatives. The definition of no kill is saving those who are not irremediably suffering. It takes the will of the shelter AND the will of community to make that happen by developing resources and intervention techniques that meet the animals’ needs and bringing those animals to the attention of public who wants to help!
You can help by sharing the page and also by making a donation to the savethesaveable.com marketing campaign at https://www.nokillpimacounty.org/donate/ and selecting savethesaveable.com.